I’m currently sitting in Seven Cups tea house in Tucson, AZ. It’s an introverted writer’s dream. The tea is delicious, the AC just right, and I’m the only guest. Slow erhu music is playing softly enough to ignore and loudly enough to create an almost meditative atmosphere. I could never write in a crowded coffee shop, but this is heaven. There are no distractions, so even when I’m hitting a bump in the road, I have no choice but to sit with it and work my way through. A sip of tea is my only break. And I’m not even much of a tea drinker. But this? This, I could seriously get used to.
I suppose this is what traveling does to you. You try out new things. Things you wouldn’t do at home, simply because at home you’ve got your routines, and there’s a certain inertia that takes conscious effort to overcome.
The past ten weeks have been a very interesting time in my life. The pandemic has made me question many things I took for granted, and I’ve discovered that some things I used to value aren’t all that important anymore. And some others, seemingly out of nowhere, took center stage. You might say that I was on a scouting trip. I wanted to find out if I could see myself living here in Tucson. Of course I picked the hottest part of the hottest year on record to try it, but that was on purpose (well, summer was; the hottest year on record… not so much). If I can take the summers here, I can certainly take the winters.
It’s been an interesting experience, and as much as I despise the expression “lessons learned”, there are a few things that I have indeed learned. For one, change and routine are two sides of the same coin, and one without the other doesn’t make for a balanced life. Two, I make a decent hermit and don’t crave a whole lot of social contact, but when I do want it, I’m quite comfortable initiating it. Three, my comfort zone is surprisingly elastic and can take way more than just incremental stretching. And, four, an extended nomadic existence isn’t for me. I need the stability of a home base, and when I do travel, I want to travel light. (Of course the fact that I bought two big shopping bags full of books to expand my already teetering TBR pile doesn’t help).
There are probably quite a few more lessons still patiently waiting their turn to surface. I’m curious to see which new insights and habits will stay with me and which ones will fall by the wayside. And I’m curious to see if I’ll be able to carry this openness to new people and experiences back to my customary surroundings.